Audio quality in android smartphones in general, has always been an area of neglect. Only a few manufacturers have paid serious attention to equip their smartphones with quality speakers and dacs before 2018 (LG and htc, to name a few). Despite their diligence, the sales of smartphones from these companies dwindled year after year. Whether it is due to their failure to market their devices properly, audiophiles preferring to listen through their expensive speakers and headphones at home or lacklustre software is a discussion for another day. After all, audio quality is only one among many priorities a smartphone maker should focus on.
For a long time, a smartphone user who wanted quality audio from a non-LG or non-htc device had only one option. Rooting their devices and installing custom software from XDA. Viper4android is a sound equaliser for rooted android devices made by developers at XDA. https://forum.xda-developers.com/android/apps-games/app-viper4android-fx-2-6-0-0-t3774651I myself have in the past installed viper4android in some of my previous devices such as Galaxy Tab S and Xiaomi Redmi Note 3. It was and continues to be a very powerful and highly customisable equaliser that has the potential to truly change the way one listens to music in their android smartphone. Noozoxide Eizo rewire was another sound equaliser that required root access. Unfortunately, I never had much luck with this software. However, many users have reported significant improvements to their smartphone audio as a result of using this app.
Wavelet is the new name among advanced sound equalisers for Android smartphones. It was developed by an XDA Senior Member named pittvandewitt. This software’s most significant advantage compared to viper4android or noozoxide is that it does not require root access. Following are some of the features of this app. An Autoeq feature that adjusts the audio depending on your headphone or earphone (currently the app supports a wide variety of headsets by various brands including Sony, Sennheiser, Beyerdynamic, one more and many others), a nine-band graphical equaliser, multiple effects such as bass boost, reverb and virtualisation. Gain controls are also available on this app. There are two modes in this app, Legacy mode and non-Legacy mode. Legacy mode tries to apply the effects of this app system-wide in the smartphone. In contrast, the non-Legacy mode offers more features but supports only limited apps including Spotify, Gaana, Poweramp, Blackplayer, Shuttle, Youtube Music etc. https://www.xda-developers.com/make-your-headphones-sound-better-automatic-eq-wavelet/.
I have tested out this app on my Oneplus7Pro and paired this app with Sony Wh1000XM3. A particular auto eq option for this headphone in this app boosted the mids and highs while lowering the bass. This, in turn, made the sound signature of XM3 more balanced. Those who like the original bass enhanced sound signature of XM3 have the option of not turning on the Autoeq option. I have tested out ‘wavelet’ with apps such as Gaana, Spotify, poweramp and Blackplayer. In general, the experience was very smooth. However, on some occasions, the app behaved in an erratic manner (some options in this app like bass boost, reverberation, and even auto eq froze), forcing me to force close the app relaunch it. Such occurrences were very annoying. In general, I can say that this app improved the smartphone audio from my Oneplus7Pro considerably. I will recommend this app to all smartphone audio enthusiasts. It is also heartening to note that the developer of this app updates it frequently.
P.S: I am using a paid version of this app. The free version does not give access to all features.
